


The Five Times Nat Slept With An Avenger (And the One Time They All Slept Together)

by flipflop_diva, RsCreighton



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Audio Format: MP3, Avengers Tower, BAMF Natasha Romanov, Community: pt-lightning, Everyone Is Poly Because Avengers, F/M, Multi, Natasha Needs a Hug, Natasha-centric, POV Natasha Romanov, PT-Lightning Challenge: Round 5, Podfic, Podfic Length: 30-45 Minutes, Post-Avengers (2012), Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Protective Avengers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-30
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-27 10:42:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2689838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flipflop_diva/pseuds/flipflop_diva, https://archiveofourown.org/users/RsCreighton/pseuds/RsCreighton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha isn't really the trusting, loving type. Sometimes team bonding has to happen in different ways. Or, exactly what the title says. Set at various times from post-Avengers to sometime in the future.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Five Times Nat Slept With An Avenger (And the One Time They All Slept Together)

39:54

 

[Listen @ Mediafire](http://www.mediafire.com/listen/161eed83g1e4a5c/Five_Times_Nat_Slept_With_An_Avenger.mp3)

[Download @ Mediafire](http://www.mediafire.com/download/161eed83g1e4a5c/Five_Times_Nat_Slept_With_An_Avenger.mp3) (37 MB)

 

 

**[Clint]**

For a second, she couldn’t remember how she had gotten there — lying on something hard and cold, agonizing pain wracking her body — but she was aware enough to know she couldn’t stay there.

The air was musky, like a red-tinted fog, and she choked as she slid herself forward on her stomach, staying low to escape observation. Not that standing would have been a great idea at the moment anyway. She was pretty sure the bullet hole in her calf was bleeding out everywhere.

Pain dimmed her vision as she struggled to move. Through the haze, she could hear the last echoes of gunshots and she hoped their side was winning.

She couldn’t see Barton anywhere.

_Barton._

It all came flooding back to her. The abandoned warehouse, the stolen drugs, the Russian operative who knew who she was and who had called her out for so many things she had never wanted anyone to know, the way Barton had looked at her, like maybe he hadn’t made the right choice in sparing her life just nine months before.

But she couldn’t worry about that now. First things first.

Dark boots, made for combat, stepped into her line of sight. She heard the faint click of a trigger.

It was more than enough time. She had her gun pulled and a bullet through his head before he could even entirely focus on her. She grabbed the fallen gun and stuffed it into her waistband.

She could hear the low rumble of more feet approaching, but she couldn’t see them yet. She looked to her left, at the empty barrels that had once transported the drugs. She couldn’t outrun the feet, she knew that. But if she could get a little leverage …

She gritted her teeth and rolled hard to her side. The pain was almost all encompassing. She focused on remembering to breathe, on remembering to think.

She clambered behind the barrels, moving as fast as she could. The boots were louder now. Closer. She waited.

The sound got louder.

There.

They were by her head.

She aimed her pistols and fired, hearing rather than seeing the grunts and the crashes as bodies fell.

But then a hand was on her shoulder, grabbing her tightly. She tried to turn over, to fight it off, but the world narrowed, grew dark. The last thing she heard was Barton’s voice in her ear calling out, “Dammit, Natasha!”

•••

She startled awake, every sense alert and on edge. Her fingers automatically felt for the pistols in her waistband.

Nothing.

Her eyes darted to the left, just as a hand grabbed hers. She swung with her other arm and another hand blocked her.

“Tasha!”

She blinked, focused.

_Barton._

He was staring down at her, something like a half-smile, half-frown on his face. She tilted her head to look beyond him. They were in what appeared to be a cabin. Small, one room, wooden walls. She was lying on a hard mattress on the floor. There was no other furniture, just a bag of supplies that Barton carried with him and a bag she had hidden earlier before they had attacked.

She glanced down at her leg, wiggling her toes. The movement hurt, but the pain was a lot duller than it had been. Her leg was bandaged, but she could see red peeking through, even in the dim lighting of the cabin.

“How did we get here?” she said.

“Did you think I would leave you?” he asked. He let go of her hands, apparently confident now she wouldn’t attack him. “Coulson’s sending an extraction team. They’ll be here tomorrow. As long as you don’t get an infection, you should be okay until then.”

She nodded, studied him. He wasn’t looking at her any differently than he had before they started the mission, but if he now knew some of the things she had done …

“What Yakubovich said …,” she started, feeling an uncharacteristic need to explain — a need, perhaps, to not lose the first partner she had in this new life — but he just pressed a finger to his lips and shook his head.

“Don’t,” he said. “You don’t owe me anything. We have a while before they get here. Why don’t you get some rest?”

“And what about you?”

“I’ll keep guard.”

“How about you lie next to me?” The words slipped from her lips before she could think about them. He frowned at her. She stared right back. It wasn’t like they hadn’t been intimate before. Of course they had. But this was different. She felt it, and she knew he did too.

She scooted over to make room, to show him she meant it. He kept looking at her like he wasn’t sure who she was but he lay down beside her.

A few minutes later, as he wrapped an arm around her waist, presumably to keep her close to him since the mattress was so small, she felt an ache in her heart she couldn’t ever remember feeling before.

She wondered if this was what trust felt like.

 

**[Tony]**

She almost fell asleep three times on the way from the shawarma place back to Tony’s, which was bad considering it was barely fifteen minutes, even with all the rubble and destruction they had to maneuver around, but it was even worse considering they were all walking during the time. She was pretty sure that someone with strong arms was carrying her at one point, but so much had happened and she was so exhausted that — even though she normally required written permission for someone to even lean over into her personal space let alone touch her — she decided it wasn’t worth fighting about. She just secretly hoped it had been Thor and not the Other Guy, because she didn’t think her subconscious could handle that scenario.

By the time they reached what was left of Stark Tower — well, actually, a lot of it was left, but Tony was definitely going to be doing some reconstruction — she wanted nothing more than to tumble headfirst into the first bed she saw, but the other guys (or rather, Tony) had different ideas.

“Drinks on me!” Tony yelled as he ushered them all into a room where a bar stretched along the entire wall overlooking the mess of a city they had left behind.

“Who else would they be on?” Thor asked, with a slight note of confusion in his voice, and Banner patted him on the arm.

“I don’t drink,” Steve said, and Tony stopped in his tracks, an eyebrow almost going through the roof.

“Serum,” Steve said. “Can’t get drunk.”

“Drink anyway,” Tony said. He passed out beers, tossing them through the air to all of them. Natasha was glad she had good instincts. She reached out and caught hers almost unconsciously, about half a second before it would have nailed her in the head.

Tony waited until everyone had their beers open, and then he held his up. “To us!” he said. “For saving the world!”

“To us,” everyone else murmured, and bottles clanked as people began to drink.

Natasha sank down on to the couch in the middle of the room, Barton on her left. A few seconds later, Tony plopped down on her other side. She tried to shoot him a glare for jostling her, but there was no energy behind it.

“Agent Romanoff,” he said and smirked at her.

“Stark,” she answered coolly, studying him as she took another sip.

“Do you still think I'm volatile, self-obsessed, and not able to play well with others?”

“Yes,” she said, not missing a beat.

“Even after I saved your life? And every other person’s on earth?”

She shrugged. “I stand behind every word I said.”

“I don’t like you, you know that?”

She nodded, letting the tiniest hint of a smile play over her lips. “I know,” she said.

“Good,” he said. He leaned back against the couch and closed his eyes. But not without tapping her on the leg with his hand. “I’m only letting you stay because it would be rude of me to kick you out. And I’m never rude.”

“Never,” she said seriously, rolling her eyes.

“At least we agree on something.”

“Hmmmmm.”

•••

Her eyes flew open when the pillow shifted underneath her head. She turned her head a fraction of an inch, taking stock of the situation, as she heard the pillow take a deep breath.

A faint gasp left her lips as she turned her head a fraction of an inch more.

_Tony._

They were still on the same couch, both of them stretched out. She glanced down. His arm was wrapped snugly around her waist, but oddly, he wasn’t touching her anywhere inappropriate.

She tried to remember when she fell asleep, but her best guess was somewhere between the fourth and fifth beers.

She thought about moving. Natasha Romanoff did not snuggle with anyone. Ever. And she didn’t even like Tony. But she was quite comfortable. And warm. And frankly, she was still exhausted.

What would it hurt to get a few more hours of sleep and then slip away before anyone else noticed?

As her eyes slid closed, and Tony shifted just slightly beneath her, Natasha found herself wondering if this was the start of something slightly less antagonistic between them.

She wondered if this was what the beginning of mutual respect felt like.

 

**[Steve]**

She couldn’t sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, all she saw were the faces of people she thought she had known. People she thought she had trusted. People she thought trusted her.

Fury.

Maria.

Rumlow.

Pierce.

Sitwell.

How could she not have seen it? How could she have been so blind?

She slipped outside, away from the rest of them, settling down on the edge of a damn overlooking the Potomac. It was after midnight, and the world was almost silent. Just the fluttering of bat wings in the night sky.

She took a deep breath and tried to focus on tomorrow. On where she would go and what she would do once SHIELD was gone.

On who she would be.

She didn’t hear him until he was right behind her. She mentally scolded herself for losing focus.

“Hey,” she said before he could. She turned her head and smiled at him. His hands were stuffed in his pockets and his hair was ruffled like he’d just woken up. Even in the dim light of the moon, she could see the concern in his eyes as he looked at her. She wished he would stop. She already owed him too much as it was.

“You okay?” he asked.

She nodded. He gestured to a spot on her right, and she nodded again to let him know it was okay. He sank down next to her. “Are you ever going to stop lying to me?”

She turned her attention to the water stretched out in front of them. “Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping?”

“Aren’t you?”

“I’m not destroying three hellicarriers that are going to take out millions of people tomorrow.”

“No, you’re just going face to face with Pierce.”

She shrugged. She felt a warm hand come down to cover most of her right thigh. She turned to look at him. He looked exhausted. Sad. But strangely determined. It bothered her in a way she couldn’t explain that even though she knew how worried he was about Bucky, he was here making sure she was okay.

“Talk to me, Nat.” He nudged her shoulder with his.

“I should say the same to you,” she answered.

“Okay,” he said. “If I go first, then you have to go after.”

She smirked. “I don’t negotiate, Rogers.”

“It’s not a negotiation, Romanoff.” He smirked back at her, and then his face grew serious, his eyes distant. When he spoke, his voice was low. “I’m worried about what’s going to happen tomorrow when I see Bucky,” he said. “I can’t hurt him.”

She covered his hand on her leg with her own. “You’ll do the right thing,” she said.

“I wish I knew what that was.”

“You’ll know,” she said, her voice firm. Because he would. If anyone would always do the right thing, it was Steve Rogers.

Her fingers traced patterns on the top of his hand.

“Your turn,” he said softly.

She didn’t say anything for a moment, just concentrated on his hand below hers, on the water beneath them. Keep everything hidden. Don’t let anyone in. That’s what she had always been taught. It was a hard habit to break. But she owed him …

“I thought Fury trusted me,” she finally said, her voice low, as if not saying it loud enough would make it less true. “I thought … “ She trailed off. Maybe she couldn’t say the words after all.

Steve said them for her. “You thought he was your friend?”

“It was stupid.”

“It’s not stupid.”

A bitter laugh escaped her mouth. “It’s not smart.”

“I think he does trust you.”

She turned to look at him. “You’re a horrible liar, Rogers.”

He shrugged. “Maybe you should give me tips.”

“No,” she said. “Not going to happen.” She tilted sideways, leaning against him, letting her head drop on to his shoulder. His hand left her leg and wrapped around her waist, holding her close.

“We should go get some sleep,” he murmured into her hair after a while. “Tomorrow’s going to be a hard day.”

She shook her head against his shoulder. “Can’t. When I’m alone with my thoughts …”

“Who says you’re going to be alone?”

She lifted her head and raised a brow at him, but he just smiled at her and helped her to her feet. He took her hand and walked her back inside the bunker, leading her down the hall to the room he had been given for the night. It looked like the one she had been given — small and empty except for a small table and a full-size bed.

“Steve …” she started.

“We’re just going to sleep, Nat.”

“What if I don’t want to just sleep?”

He didn’t answer her, just let her climb into bed first, then slid in beside her. It wasn’t close to the first time she had shared a bed with a man — in all senses of the word — but this time felt different. As he studied her in the darkness of the room, she placed a hand on his cheek and pressed her lips to his, needing everything he was willing to offer for this one night.

She wondered if this was what real friendship felt like.

 

**[Bruce]**

Natasha Romanoff did not get crushes. She did not do giddy schoolgirl butterflies or make swooning eyes at boys. She did not fall in love and she did not want to. Love was for children, and she was not a child. She had not been a child for many, many years.

But this _thing_ with Bruce was beginning to grate on her nerves. She had been living in Avengers Tower for just more than two months. It seemed the safest course of action after she had disappeared off the grid for a while once SHIELD fell. But she was too recognizable, and too many of her secrets were now public knowledge, and she had faced too many close calls in the four months she had spent alone.

And Tony, for all his faults, wasn’t going to let her get killed. So in she moved, taking up residence with Tony, Pepper and Bruce, who had been the first Avenger guest.

The first few weeks had been fine. She spent most of her time training. Bruce spent most of his time working with Tony on top-secret things they refused to tell her about and she didn’t care enough to try and snoop out on her own. They’d cross paths over coffee in the morning or maybe dinner. A quick hello, a brief conversation about their days.

And then it changed. Coffee became breakfast, and dinner became movie nights on the couch, and brief conversations became hours-long talks sitting out on one of the balconies overlooking the city. And Natasha found herself searching for Bruce and smiling when he walked in and feeling disappointed when he wasn’t around.

And she couldn’t take it anymore. Not the looks she saw him give her when he didn’t think she was looking (she was always looking) nor the way he smiled back when she walked into a room, but especially not the sensations she felt every time she thought about him. It was a strange change from the fear she had once felt, but the Other Guy hadn’t made an appearance in months, and Bruce was nothing but kind to her. So kind, in fact, that it was putting her off-balance, and she couldn’t have that.

So one Friday night, when she and Tony and Bruce were having their morning cup of coffee, she decided to just take action.

She waited till she had Bruce’s attention and then she just said it. “I think we should have sex.”

She grimaced in disgust as coffee flew at her from two directions. Tony looked like he had just won the lottery. Bruce was spluttering.

“W-w-what?” Bruce finally managed.

“What?” she said.

“Did you just say what I think you said?”

“You don’t want to?”

“W-w-hat?” Bruce spluttered again. “That isn’t … why … Natasha, what is going on?”

She shrugged at him. “Tony and Pepper are going away for the weekend,” she said. “I thought it’d be fun.”

“HA!” Tony’s outburst had her turning to him with a glare. He smirked at her, looking like a cat who ate the canary. “Romanoff has a crush!”

“I do not,” she said instantly, but Tony was shaking his head and smirking and laughing.

“You so do,” he said. “This is great! Wait till I tell Pepper!”

“You tell anyone …” But her threat was drowned out as Tony walked out of the kitchen, still laughing uproariously.

Natasha was glad she had long ago learned to control her body’s reaction to flush, because if she hadn’t, she would have been as red as her hair. Instead she just shrugged coolly, muttered “Never mind,” to Bruce and headed off to train.

•••

Bruce found her the next day in the training gym. He stood behind her, hands in his pockets, until she finished and walked over to him.

“Afternoon,” she greeted him.

“Can I talk to you?”

“Of course.”

“About yesterday.”

She almost faltered, but instead she forced a smile. “I was just playing around.”

“No, you weren’t” — she hated that he knew that — “but it’s okay. I _do_ want to have sex with you, you know.”

She blinked. “You do?”

“But I can’t.”

“You can’t?”

Bruce smiled wryly. “The Other Guy,” he said, and he sounded sad. “I’m not sure how … I don’t want to hurt you, Natasha.”

“Oh,” she said, and then she smiled. “It’s okay. I don’t really want to see him either.”

He leaned in then, pressed his lips to hers. She pulled away.

“I thought you said …”

“I said I can’t have sex with you,” Bruce said. “I didn’t say we couldn’t do other things. Or that I couldn’t do other things _to_ you.”

She frowned. “What?” and then “Oh. … OH!”

Twenty minutes later, she was lying naked on Bruce’s bed, his head nuzzled against her thigh, two fingers inside her as she writhed against him.

“It’s okay, Nat.” His breath ghosted over her, making her shiver. “Just let go. I’m not going to hurt you.”

She wondered if this was what it felt like to be taken care of.

 

**[Thor]**

It had to be at least thirty below zero in Avengers Tower from the way she was shivering. It was January, and what the news reports were calling “New York’s biggest blizzard in centuries” was currently blanketing the streets and the buildings of the city. On top of that, the gusts of wind had knocked most of the power out two hours before.

Natasha had been in bed when the power disappeared, but with no heat or power and beginning to feel like a human ice cube, she finally dragged herself from bed, wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and headed two floors down via staircase.

She found four of her five housemates — if that’s what one could call them. They had all somehow found their way to Avengers Tower, some moving in without much fanfare, some moving in with a lot of fanfare, over the course of the months after she did — in the kitchen, standing around the center island and sipping coffee by the light of a couple lanterns. Steve was off on a mission, but she frowned at the others as she approached, none of whom seemed bothered by this otherworldly level of cold.

Thor — of course — had his shirt off. Sometimes she wondered if he owned clothes. Banner, Barton and Stark were dressed, but in nothing more than a single layer.

“Why is there not a generator for the heater?” she muttered to them as she made her way into the kitchen, the blanket trailing on the floor behind her. “And how are you drinking coffee?”

“It’s the leftovers from this morning. It’s now iced,” Bruce said, as if this were perfectly reasonable.

Natasha made a face. Just the thought made her feel queasy. Actually, she was feeling quite queasy, come to think of it.

She stepped closer to them, so she could be seen in the flickering light of the lanterns.

The four men had all turned to look at her when she walked in, but now she could see their eyes widening as they took her in. For a second, judging by their looks, she almost wondered if she had accidentally walked in naked — except she was pretty sure she would have been even colder.

“What?” she said testily. She hated people staring at her for no reason.

“Nat …” It was Barton who spoke first. “Are you okay?”

“Of course I’m not okay.” She stepped up next to him. Maybe she could snag some body heat. “It’s freezing in here. How are you all not freezing?”

No one answered. Instead Barton slammed a hand on to her forehead.

“Hey!” she protested. “What …?”

“Yeah, she has a fever,” Barton said to the other guys in the room, as if she wasn’t even there.

“I have a name,” she muttered. “And I do not.”

Now he was looking at her again, this time with that smug look he always got when he knew more than she did. “Yes, you do,” he said. “You’re burning up. You should be in bed.”

Natasha shook her head. Nope. She never got sick. Ever. It was just the cold. Although the room was starting to tilt a little.

She reached out a hand to steady herself, but before she could, she was being lifted off the ground.

“Hey!” she protested again. “Thor! Put me down!” If she hadn’t been so cold, she would have put up a fight, but Thor _was_ very warm.

“What are you doing with her?” Tony asked Thor.

“The little spider is cold,” Thor replied, and he shifted Natasha in his arms, holding her closer against him. “I will warm her.”

“Ummmmm …. how so?” Tony asked.

“Asgardians have much hotter bodies than humans,” Thor said.

“Huh,” Bruce said. “I can see that.”

Natasha felt like she should say something. Or punch someone. She was not one to be carried around like a baby. Except she was starting to get some feeling back in her body. She lifted her hand and pressed it against Thor’s chest.

Yeah, that felt nice.

Thor walked out of the kitchen and into the room they most commonly used for movie nights. There was a huge, very comfortable couch in the middle. He seated himself on it, stretching out, arranging Natasha so she was lying on his chest, her chest, her hands, her legs, all soaking up his warmth.

“Are you comfortable, little spider?” Thor asked her.

“Mmmmmm,” Natasha mumbled, because who knew Asgardians were like human-sized pillows?

She felt her eyes start to drift close as she heard the other three men enter the room. Someone arranged another blanket over her, and she felt someone else stroke her hair. At some point, she woke up to someone giving her something faintly medicinal to drink, but she wasn’t sure who. She was just so warm. And comfortable.

If it bothered Thor at all that she was on top of him, he didn’t say anything. He just held her in his arms and waited for her to feel better. She was pretty sure she felt him press his lips to the top of her head, but as she drifted off again, she found she didn’t mind.

She wondered if this was what it felt like to have a family.

 

**[Everyone]**

The sound was as loud as if the world were ending. A blast so strong and so intense it knocked her backward off her feet, her head striking the ground. But she was up again before she could even register that her head was bleeding, sprinting forward, toward the chaos, toward the destruction.

She could see the wood and the stone and the brick still falling, a pile of debris where once stood a building.

She could hear the sound of screaming in the air, could taste the metallic sting of blood and tears. It didn’t occur to her that she was the one who was shouting, who was crying.

The comm in her ear had gone silent. Just static and the sound of her heart breaking.

_They couldn’t be dead._

She reached the entrance of what once was the warehouse and stared down into the pit that had formed, watching as the last pieces of wall and ceiling fell and shattered. She couldn’t hear anything, she couldn’t see anyone.

Her whole world narrowed.

They had been inside. _All_ of them. Steve. Clint. Tony. Bruce. Thor. On a tip from Fury and a plea from her, because she had known whom the bastard was who was kidnapping children and she had to stop him. Because she couldn’t let someone steal the lives of those innocent little ones, couldn’t let someone make them into something they weren’t.

And the guys had agreed, without a word, and off they had all gone, another day, another mission.

They told her to go left, to catch the enemies escaping. They would meet her inside.

But it was a trap, and now …

Natasha stumbled forward, through what once was a doorway but now was just a pillar of rock. There was _nothing_. No enemies, no friends, no people.

_They couldn’t be dead._

But how could they be alive?

She began to move, pushing aside beams and tossing away bricks, calling out for them, one by one and all together. She coughed in the dust, struggling for breath that seemed stuck in her throat. Her eyes stung, her vision blurred, but she kept moving, ducking and dodging and searching.

But there was nothing.

_There was nothing._

She let out a cry, raw and ragged and so painful she didn’t think it would ever stop hurting. Her muscles finally gave out, and she fell, sinking down into the middle of the horror, a small figure lost amongst it.

And then a voice, and another, and another, calling to her, calling her name. Like in a dream.

She looked up. And no. It couldn’t be. _They were there._ All of them. Dusty and bloody and bruised, but they were there.

Another cry and she was stumbling toward them, all grace and coordination gone. And then arms were lifting her up, pulling her toward them.

“I thought you were dead! I thought you were dead!” It was the only thing she could say, as hands stroked her and lips kissed her and voices murmured, “We’re okay. We’re okay,” over and over and over.

They tumbled on to the biggest bed in Avengers Tower the moment they got home, no one asking to make sure it was alright, everyone just knowing it was. She’d clung to all of them the whole Quinjet ride back, terrified they would vanish if she only let go, and now they were returning the favor.

Hands stroked her, soothed her, gently peeled away her clothes. Lips caressed her, kissed her, trailed over her wounds and her scars. She wrapped her arms and her legs around them, one by one and then together, pulled them in closer. Teeth nicked at her lower lip, nuzzled her ear, bit down on her breasts. She arched her back and closed her eyes, and felt their fingers and then themselves inside her, over and over and over.

She let go each time in a stream of Russian expletives and salty tears until she had no energy left to give. Then she curled up into Steve’s broad chest and waited till the rest of them were done.

They positioned themselves around her, all five of them. The men on the outside and her in the middle, tucked safely between Steve and Tony, Clint’s head on her legs, and Thor and Bruce bookending them all.

“I thought you were all dead,” she whispered into the dark room, because the weight on her chest was only finally lifting and it needed to be said.

“You can’t get rid of us that easily, Natalia Romanova,” someone whispered in return, as Thor gently chided, “Now go to sleep, little spider.”

So she closed her eyes and pressed closer to Steve, as Tony’s hand stroked her back and Clint hummed an unrecognizable tune and Bruce let out a contented sigh.

And as she drifted off, she knew: This was exactly what love felt like.


End file.
